The Mediterranean fishing nations of Europe have rejected the proposed measures to help keep the endangered bluefin tuna safe. These measures were proposed just last month by Maria Damanaki, the EU fishing chief.

This “Nay”, which was given this past Wednesday, means that the 27-nation EU will join in the international quota discussions in Paris this week. This discussion will center around harsher methods to help save the fish, whose numbers have been declining exponentially over the past four decades.

The EU is seen as one of the best in the world when it comes to Atlantic bluefin. These bluefin can grow as big as a horse, swim faster than a sports car, and can be hawked at markets in Japan for a whopping $100,000.

The bluefin quota for this past year was 13,500 tonnes and Damaki has commented that in order to help the bluefin get back on their feet, that the quota should be reduced to 6,000 tonnes for 2011. This was suggested last month at the ICCAT – International Commission for Conservation of Atlantic Tunas. The ICCAT discussions, due to last ten days, began this past Wednesday.

Ms. Damanaki granted that in order for fishermen to maintain their livelihoods that the quota would need to be more than 6,000 tonnes. However, in a meeting this past Wednesday, the EU ambassadors to Brussels, which were led by France, squawked at the notion and submitted one of their own, which doesn’t even take into consideration any quota reductions.

“Nevertheless, the Commission will respect its obligations as the negotiator on behalf of the European Union,” Ms. Damanaki responded somewhat tersely.

Conservationists have accused France of not being green enough – see the fact that they parked a giant tuna in front of their commission offices.
“It’s a bad start,” commented an adviser to the U.S.-based Pew Environment Group, Remi Parmentier. “Here we have a real test-case of the EU putting words into action for reforming fisheries.”

During recent years, massive jellyfish congregations have appeared along the Northeast U.S. coast, in the Gulf of Mexico, in the Mediterranean, in the Black and Caspian Seas, and in South-East Asian coastal waters.

“Dense jellyfish aggregations can be a natural feature of healthy ocean ecosystems, says Dr Anthony Richardson of the University of Queensland, but a clear picture is now emerging of more severe and frequent jellyfish outbreaks worldwide.”

A new study by Richardson and his colleagues at the University of Miami, Swansea University and the University of the Western Cape, presents convincing evidence that these massive jellyfish populations are supported by the release of excess nutrients from fertilisers and sewage, and that fish populations depleted by over-fishing no longer are capable of keeping them in check.

“Fish normally keep jellyfish in check through competition and predation but overfishing can destroy that balance,” Dr Richardson says. “For example, off Namibia intense fishing has decimated sardine stocks and jellyfish have replaced them as the dominant species. Mounting evidence suggests that open-ocean ecosystems can flip from being dominated by fish, to being dominated by jellyfish. This would have lasting ecological, economic and social consequences.”

In addition to this, the distribution of many jellyfish species may extend as a response to global warming and an increased water temperature could also favour certain species by augmenting the availability of flagellates in surface waters.

The study, which was lead by CSIRO Climate Adaptation Flagship, has been published in the journal Trends in Ecology and Evolution.

You can find more information about CSIRO Climate Adaptation Flagship here:

450 pound blobs filling up the Sea of Japan

The changing ecosystems affect a long row of different jellyfish species, but some of the most spectacular jellyfish congregations observed during recent years have involved the Nomura jellyfish (Nemopilema nomurai) living in the Sea of Japan (Also known as the East Sea). This colossal species, which can reach a size of 2 metres* across and weigh up to 220 kg**, is also present in the Yellow Sea as well as in the rest of the East China Sea.

After becoming a major problem in the region, the Nomura jellyfish population is now combated by a special committee formed by the Japanese government. Killing jellyfish or ensnaring them in nets will however only prompt these animals to release billions of sperm or eggs; aggrevating the problem rather than reducing it. Coastal communities in Japan have started to harvest jellyfish and sell them as a dried and salted snack, and students in Obama, Fukui have started making jellyfish cookies and jellyfish-based tofu.

* circa 6 feet 7 inches

** circa 450 pounds

Sarpa salpa, a fish species capable of causing long-lasting hallucinatory experiences in humans, has been caught far north of its normal range. Normally found in the warm waters of the Mediterranean and off the African west coast, Sarpa salpa is an unusual guest in northern Europe. Only three previous recordings exist from British waters, with the third being from 1983 when a single specimen was caught off the Channel Islands.

The most recent specimen of this mind altering Sparidae was caught six miles south of Polperro, Cornwall, by fisherman Andy Giles. When Giles found the strange looking creature entangled in his net he brought it back to shore to have it identified.

Picture by by Sam and Ian

“We were trawling for lemon sole but hauled up the net at the end of the day and almost immediately saw this striped fish”, Giles said. “I had never seen one before so brought it back for experts to have a look at it. But now I realise what it was – and the crazy effects it can have – perhaps I should have taken it into town to sell to some clubbers.”

Instead of selling it to clubbers, Giles could also have brought it home to the dinner table – without much risk of having any mind altering experiences. Within its native range, Sarpa salpa, commonly known as Salema porgy, is a popular food fish and suffering from hallucinations after ordering a plate of Salema in a Mediterranean restaurant is very rare.

According to marine experts, Sarpa salpa has to feed on a certain types of plankton in order to become hallucinogen. In 2006, two men were hospitalized in southern France after eating Sarpa salpa who evidently had feasted on vast amounts of psychedelic plankton before being caught.

“Plankton has very minute amounts of poison and fish that eat a great deal of it can develop this poisoning”, says Oliver Crimmen, fish curator at the Natural History Museum. Sarpa salpa are a popular fish to eat in the Mediterranean and I think the 2006 incident was a rare event.”

So, why can urge a Sarpa salpa to leave the pleasant waters of Africa and head for chilly Britain? According to James Wright, senior biologist at the National Marine Aquarium in Plymouth, the fish may simply have tagged along when some other species decided to head north, but it may also be possible that the species is on the rise in northern Europe.

“These are a fairly common fish off Tenerife, Malta and Cyprus but it is very rare to get them this far north. It could be a single fish that was shoaling with a different species, says Wright. But it could be that there are more of them in our waters.”

I thought I would report on a few good news in the world of marine conservation. First of we are going to look at tuna fishing and the endangered Mediterranean Blue fin Tuna. The International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) an organization consisting of NGOs and governments surprisingly voted to cut tuna quotas in half (almost) in the Mediterranean as well as instituting a complete fishing ban during the spawning season in May and June when they meet at the World Conservation Congress in Barcelona. The surprising result came after Spain (an important fishing nation) and Japan (the key blue fin market) supported the restricted fishing to prevent the tuna population from collapsing. The IUCN Decision is not legally binding but puts a considerable amount of pressure on the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT) which will decide the future of tuna fishing for the coming years at a meeting in December. The effects of diminished quotas remain to be seen as a rapport from the WWF earlier this month showed that half all tuna caught in Italy was caught illegally and that illegal fishing was rampant in Italy.

I am going to leave tuna and talk about something completely different, Beluga whales. The US government this week listed the Beluga whales of Alaska’s Cook Inlet as an endangered species / population. The decision means much stricter rules about what can and can’t be done in the area and local authorities need to get the permission of the National Marine Fisheries Service before they can approve a number of activities in the area. Governor and GOP vice president candidate Sara Palin is worried that the decision will prevent economic growth in the area. She fears that the decision among other things will prevent the expansion of the harbor. The population declined nearly 50 percent between 1994 and 1998 and has not yet recovered. This is believed to be due to developments in the area, predation from killer whales and frequent whale strandings. Environmentalists hope that the new found protection will help increase the population again.

Beluga whale

The International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tunas (ICCAT) estimates that 51 percent of all the Bluefin tuna caught in the Mediterranean during 2007 was illegal and unauthorised. According to the commission, the total catch for last year was 61,000 tones – a sharp contrast to the agreed quota of 29,500 tones. The commission is now warning for a complete collapse of the tune stocks in the Mediterranean, unless drastic measures are put into action.

According to the commission, the recovery plan implemented over the past two years by tuna fishing countries has failed to improve the poor state of the tuna stocks. If the Mediterranean tuna stocks collapse, it will not only be a catastrophe from a conservational perspective; it will also have serious consequences for all those who get their livelihood from tuna fishing in the area.

“Scientists have made the situation clear and now it is necessary for ICCAT and all the states involved in blue fin tuna exploitation to act in order to halt the decline and prevent a collapse“, says Xavier Pastor, the director of Oceana, an organisation that works to protect the world’s oceans. “Drastic measures should be adopted, such as closing the Mediterranean tuna fishery from June to August, the blue fin tuna’s reproductive months.”

A Greater Weever (Trachinus draco) has been found in a stretch of the Thames estuary in Great Britain. The species, which is native to the Eastern Atlantic, the Mediterranean, and the Black Sea, is one of many signs of the improving health of the Thames estuary.

The weever was found after a two-year investigation carried out by the Environment Agency and Zoological Society of London and is the 60th new species found in the Thames since 2006. “The diversity and abundance of fish is an excellent indicator of the estuary’s health”, says Environment Agency Fishery Officer Emma Barton.

Flowing through London and several other urban areas, the Thames has a long history of being heavily polluted. In the so called ‘Great Stink’ of 1858, pollution in the river was so severe that sittings at the House of Commons at Westminister had to be abandoned.

So, should we fear this semi-new addition to the Thames estuary? No, there is no need to panic. This fish can deliver a very painful sting and should be handled with care, but the sting is rarely dangerous to humans – especially not if you seek medical attention.

The Greater Weever has venom glands attached to both of the spines on its first dorsal fin, and to the spines of the gill cover. The spines are equipped with grooves through which venom is driven up if the spines are pressed. A person that receives a sting from a Greater Weever can develop localized pain and swelling, and the result has – in a few rare cases – been fatal. Fortunately, there are several things you can do to make the situation less dangerous for a stung victim.

· If the wound bleeds, allow the wound to bleed freely (within reason of course) to expel as much venom as possible.

· Soak the affected limb in warm water because the toxin produced by the Greater Weever is sensitive to heat. There is no need use extremely hot water it and risk scalding the skin, because the toxin will deteriorate at a temperature of 40° C / 104° F.

· Seek medical attention.

The pain is normally at its most intense during the first two hours after being stung and even without treatment, the severe pain normally goes away within 24 hours. It is however possible for some pain to last for up to two weeks, and it is also possible for the spine to break off and get stuck inside the stung limb where it can continue to cause problems until it is removed.

Working together WWF and Greenpeace have obtained evidence that the tune fleet working in the central Mediterranean is using airplanes to find tune. This practice is internationally banned in the Mediterranean as it allows the oversized fishing fleet to catch to much tuna and make to big damage to the tuna population. Read more about this here

Blue fin tuna fetches a very high price on the international market and the species is becoming increasingly threatened by over fishing. Illegal fishing operations are common. Although attempts are being made to internationally limit the fishing and restrict the fishing quotas (or even ban fishing for a few years) little progress is made due to the economic value of this fish. Recently however a number of encouraging actions have been taken by individual nations and private interests. One such action is that one of the biggest sea food whole sellers in the UK that sell to a lot of top restaurants etc have stopped selling blue fin tune due to the unsustainable fishing for this species.